Saturday I went to the Gotthard/HammerFall/Edguy show in Porto Alegre. We got to the venue at 6:20 AM; there were five people ahead of us. There was a dude there that wasn’t going to the show, he was simply preaching us the gospel of the Horde (seriously! he DID NOT SHUT UP about the Horde until he disappeared at around 1 PM). Our queue buddies were pretty cool; the people ahead of us did not stop drinking up until the gates opened and yet nobody threw up or anything, it was pretty impressive.
The gates opened at 4:30 PM, and the gig started at 5:00 PM. We got spots right at the barrier! The first band was Gotthard, and, despite myself not knowing a single song by them, they were so energetic that it ended up not mattering; it was awesome. Twice Leo Leoni, one of the guitarists, threw a pick that landed on my hand and bounced off. A short while after, his high E string broke during a solo, and after that, he carefully removed the broken string and handed it to me. Fucking awesome!
The HammerFall show was completely fantastic! The set list was great; they played new songs and old songs, and pretty much everyone was happy. During Last Man Standing, Joacim Cans (the lead singer) was drinking from a water bottle; he choked a bit, put the cap on the half-full bottle, and threw it at the crowd; it bounced around and landed on me!!!! I drank it all because holy shit was I thirsty, and kept the bottle.
Afterwards (don’t remember which song it was), Oscar (one of the guitarists) came close to my side of the crowd; I reached out my hand, hoping for a pick, and he carefully gave me one!!!!!!!!!! I actually cried, holy shit. And at the end of the show, Pontus threw a pick as well; I had to wrestle a bit for it hahaha
Edguy’s gig was completely nuts! The set was great but I was hoping for more power metal songs, instead of the mostly hard rock songs that they chose to play. I cried real tears during Defenders of the Crown and Tears of the Mandrake. They played All the Clowns!!!
All of the band were incredibly charismatic, there was even a drum solo! But sadly none of them gave out guitar picks or anything

I just briefly shook hands with the bassist whose name I don’t know.
All in all it was a glorious evening; after removing myself from the barrier I couldn’t walk straight (thanks to having to stand up immobile for pretty much five hours!), had sore legs, feet, back, arms and neck, and my throat is incredibly sore from singing. Completely worth getting up at 4 AM and enduring ten hours in line, in the sun, and the 12 hour car trip to and from Porto Alegre. Simply amazing.
I don't know which band I'm going to see next; hopefully Blind Guardian will come to Brazil again after they release their new album.